Fallen remembered, veterans honored in Cambria County on Memorial Day
Senator Wayne Langerholc attended Sandyvale's dedication service in Cambria County, honoring the men and women from the county who gave their lives fighting for our country. The service also honored veterans in attendance with a special pinning ceremony.
Langerholc spoke about his great-uncle, who was killed in World War II. He shared how special this day is to honor his uncle, as well as others who have served.
Veterans who spoke at the service expressed how the day has turned into a celebration for many Americans, but remembering why we have the day is what's important.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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Epoch Times
3 hours ago
- Epoch Times
Taiwan Calls on Its People to Reject CCP's Distortion of WWII, Anniversary Events
Taiwan has denounced the Chinese communist regime for using this year's anniversary to push its false claim that it was the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that led the fighting against Japan's invasion during World War II, rather than the Republic of China government, which at the time ruled China. Aug. 15 marked the 80th anniversary of the end of WWII in Asia, known as Victory over Japan Day (V-J Day), as Japan announced its surrender on that day in 1945. Taiwan, which uses the official name the Republic of China (ROC) as shown on its citizens' passports, is the last territory of the republic that also ruled mainland China from 1911 to 1949. After being defeated by the CCP in 1949 on the mainland, the ROC's nationalist government, led by Chiang Kai-shek, retreated to the island of Taiwan, which was returned to China from Japanese occupation in 1945. The Republic of China has remained Taiwan's official name since then. Meanwhile, the CCP established the communist regime, the People's Republic of China (PRC), on the mainland in 1949. The CCP claims sovereignty over Taiwan despite that it has never ruled the island and it has not ruled out the possibility of using force to annex Taiwan. As the communist regime held commemoration events, including a military parade in Beijing to celebrate the 'CCP-led victory against Japanese invasion,' Taipei's top China-policy maker warned its people to be vigilant against the CCP's distortion of history and threats against the island nation. Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng pointed out in a video released by his office on Aug. 15 that the PRC did not exist during WWII. 'The Chinese Communist regime has repeatedly distorted the facts in recent years, claiming that the war against Japan was led by the Communist Party, and has even fabricated the notion that Taiwan belongs to the People's Republic of China,' Chiu said. He called on Taiwanese people to 'unite and jointly defend national sovereignty and dignity' to participate in Taiwan-led events instead of taking part in the PRC's war commemorations, such as the parade. In a statement posted on his Facebook page on Aug. 15, Taiwan (ROC)'s president Lai Ching-te stated, without directly naming the PRC, 'the most valuable lesson of World War Two is that unity leads to victory, while aggression leads to defeat.' Lai said that as authoritarianism once again gathers strength, it is important that freedom and democracy prevail. ROC Led the War, Not CCP The ROC was part of the Allied Forces alongside the United States during WWII, and its nationalist troops played a crucial role against Japan, not the communist troops. Epoch Times columnist Li Jian examined the major battles against Japan during WWII with numbers and details in his article for the Chinese language edition on Aug. 14. He pointed out that 'during the eight-year war, there were 22 large-scale battles between China and Japan, each of them involving more than 100,000 troops. The CCP army only participated in two battles, the Pingxingguan Battle and the Hundred Regiments Offensive,' and the rest were all fought by the nationalist troops alone. 'The ROC's nationalist army led by Chiang Kai-shek was the main force in the decisive battles and the core of the war of resistance,' he wrote. After the CCP's Long March (1934–1935), which was in fact its long escape from the ROC government's pursuit from its base in the southeast inland province of Jiangxi to northwest China, the CCP built a new base in Yan'an in Shanbei, northern Shaanxi Province. The new location was away from the northeast, eastern, and southern China that were occupied by Japan and where the main battles took place during WWII in China and Asia (1937–1945). While nationalist troops fought the Japanese invasion, the CCP largely remained in Yan'an in northern China. In The Generalissimo: Chiang Kai-shek and the Struggle for Modern China (2008), U.S. historian Jay Taylor detailed the allied efforts between the nationalist troops led by Chiang and the U.S. troops during WWII in China, including the famous U.S. pilots group Flying Tigers–The American Volunteer Group of the Republic of China Air Force to help oppose the Japanese invasion of China. In Forgotten Ally: China's War with Japan, 1937–1945 (2013), British historian Rana Mitter sheds light on the major battles that China fought against Japan, mostly by the nationalist troops, over the long eight years during WWII. It also highlighted the Chinese nationalist troops' crucial role in fighting against Japanese troops in the jungle of Burma, alongside the British and the American troops, preventing Japan from moving westward in Southeast Asia and into South Asia. When the CCP arrived in Yan'an after the Long March, it had only 6,000 troops. In 1945, when the Japanese surrendered, the CCP's army had grown to more than 900,000 regular soldiers, in addition to 2 million militia fighters, according to the 'Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party,' published by The Epoch Times. 'During the war, the CCP made a show of calling for resistance to the Japanese, but they only had local armies and guerrilla forces in camps away from the frontlines,' the 'Nine Commentaries' said. 'By marching through these northern provinces, it could claim to be 'fighting the Japanese' and win people's hearts.' In 1945, when the war with the Japanese came to an end, the civil war began to break out. Chiang had 39 'American-trained divisions, he had equipment, he had a high morale among his troops,' according to Sen. Joe McCarthy in 'America's Retreat From Liberty.' However, George Marshall was posted to China from 1945 to 1947 as the U.S. special envoy to China and enforced a policy that disarmed the nationalist army and forced the ROC into a unified government with the communists, McCarthy said. 'Marshall described one of his own acts as follows: 'As Chief-of-Staff I armed 39 anti-Communist divisions. Now with a stroke of a pen I disarm them,'' he said of Marshall's actions after the war. McCarthy said that while Marshall cut off the flow of arms to Chiang, he allowed support from the communists in Russia to the communists in Yan'an to flow unabated. In contrast to the nationalists' resistance against Japan, CCP leader Mao Zedong expressed gratitude to Japan's invasion on more than one occasion, which were recorded in official documents of the CCP and have been widely cited by international historians and media. For example, in 1972, Mao met with Japanese Prime Minister Takuei in Nanjing and told him no need to apologize for Japan's atrocities committed in China during the war. '[Japan] doesn't have to say sorry, you had contributed towards China, Why? Because [if] Imperial Japan did not start the war of invasion, how could we communists have become mighty powerful?' Mao said at the time. 'How could we stage the coup d'état? How could we defeat Chiang Kai Shek? How are we going to pay back you guys? No, we do not want your war reparations!' Renowned Chinese historian Xin Haonian concluded in a speech at a forum in Texas about China's war of resistance against Japanese invasion that 'the CCP did not fight against the Japanese, falsely claimed it fought against the Japanese, and even collaborated with the enemy and sold out the country.' However, for decades, 'it has not only continued to slander the other party [the nationalists] that consistently fought against the Japanese and led the war of resistance as a party that did not fight against the Japanese, but also continued to portray itself as 'the hero who led the entire nation to fight against the Japanese and achieve final victory.'' Xin said that the CCP's purpose is to use continued deception to legitimize its rule. CCP Has Never Ruled Taiwan After WWII, Taiwan, occupied by Japan from 1895 to 1945, was returned to the ROC, according to the Cairo Declaration (1943) and the Potsdam Declaration (1945), of which the ROC's President Chiang Kai-shek was one of the signing parties along with the leaders of the UK and the United States. The ROC formally accepted the handover on Oct. 25, 1945. When the nationalist troops were defeated by the communists in mainland China in China's civil war in 1949, the ROC government retreated to Taiwan, while the CCP established its communist regime on the mainland. Taiwan's president Lai stated the fact in his presidential inaugural address in 2024 that 'the Republic of China and the People's Republic of China are not subordinate to each other.' The CCP responded to Lai's rejection of Beijing's sovereignty claim by calling him a 'separatist.' Lai emphasized earlier this year in his series of public speeches in Taiwan that the PRC has never exercised sovereignty over Taiwan or other outlying islands administered by the ROC. 'Regardless of what name we choose to call our nation—the Republic of China, the Republic of China Taiwan, or Taiwan, we are an independent country,' he said.
Yahoo
9 hours ago
- Yahoo
Democrat Senator said Alaska summit was ‘great day' for Russia: Putin was ‘absolved of his crimes in front of the world'
A key senator on the Foreign Relations committee called Donald Trump's Alaska summit with Vladimir Putin a 'disaster' Sunday and blamed the U.S. president for legitimizing his Russian opponent in front of the world. 'It was an embarrassment for the United States. It was a failure. Putin got everything he wanted,' said Chris Murphy, the ranking Democratic member of the Foreign Affairs subcommittee on European security cooperation. Murphy told NBC's Meet the Press that Trump was forced to abandon his main commitment — a call for a ceasefire — during the meeting and was similarly unable to convince Putin to drop demands for Ukraine to cede more territory, something the senator from Connecticut said was 'stunning' to see a U.S. president consider. 'He wanted to be absolved of his war crimes in front of the world. He was invited to the United States — war criminals are not normally invited to the United States of America,' Murphy said. Trump 'walked out of that meeting saying, 'I didn't get a ceasefire. I didn't get a peace deal. And I'm not even considering sanctions,'' the senator continued. 'And so Putin walks away with his photo op, with zero commitments made, and zero consequences. What a great day for Russia.' Murphy's comments to NBC come as two top Trump officials who traveled with the president to Alaska for the summit Friday, Marco Rubio and Steve Witkoff, did the rounds on separate Sunday morning programs defending the outcome of the president's meeting with Putin. The optics of the meeting are being endlessly scrutinized in the mainstream press, partly due to the few specifics released so far about what the two men discussed. Among those moments been picked apart by analysts included the arrival of the Russian president, which was preceded by U.S. troops, in uniform, rolling out a red carpet on the tarmac. On Sunday, Witkoff told CNN'S State of the Union that the U.S. secured what he claimed was a 'game-changing' development in the discussions: Putin's willingness to consider accepting a U.S. security agreement protecting the future sovereignty of Ukraine's borders. This was the first time negotiators were able to gain ground on the issue, he explained. 'We were able to win the following concession: That the United States could offer Article 5-like protection, which is one of the real reasons why Ukraine wants to be in NATO," he said. Witkoff wouldn't specify whether the security guarantee could lead to what Trump and his followers have long opposed — a promise to directly engage U.S. troops in defense of Ukraine should Russia continue crossing Trump's red lines. Murphy, on Sunday, seemed to imply that such a guarantee would be the bare minimum standard necessary for any peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia. 'That [security guarantee] is an essential element of a peace agreement because any commitment that Vladimir Putin makes to not invade Ukraine again isn't worth the paper that it's written on,' said the senator. 'He's made that commitment many times. So yes, there has to be a guarantee that if Putin were to enter Ukraine after a peace settlement, that there would be some force there, a U.S. force, a U.S.-European force there to defend Ukraine.' He would go on to hammer Trump over reports that Witkoff wouldn't confirm when pressed by CNN's Jake Tapper, which revealed that Trump had signaled his own willingness to accept Russian demands for Ukraine to cede the entire occupied Donbas region as part of a potential agreement. Murphy said that the reported development was 'another sense that Putin is just in charge of these negotiations.' Chris Van Hollen, another Democrat on the Foreign Relations panel, was equally critical of Trump's meeting with the Russian president during an interview with ABC's Martha Raddatz on This Week. Heading into Friday's summit, Trump warned of 'severe consequences' if Russia continued to oppose peace efforts and said that he was working towards an immediate ceasefire. Afterwards, he claimed in a Truth Social post that "It was determined by all [in attendance] that the best way to end the horrific war between Russia and Ukraine is to go directly to a Peace Agreement, which would end the war, and not a mere Ceasefire Agreement, which often times do not hold up.' Van Hollen called this news a 'setback' for the U.S.'s European allies and Ukraine, while accusing Trump of being 'flattered' by Putin. 'There's no sugarcoating this. Donald Trump, once again, got played by Vladimir Putin. Vladimir Putin got the red carpet treatment on American soil. But we got no ceasefire, no imminent meeting between Putin and Zelensky,' said Van Hollen. Jake Sullivan, national security adviser to the Biden administration, agreed. "President Trump's stated goals were very simple, get an immediate ceasefire, and in the absence of a ceasefire, impose what he called severe consequences," Sullivan said. "Well, the summit has come and gone. There is no ceasefire. There are no consequences.' Trump is now scheduled to meet Monday with European leaders including Finnish president Alexander Stubb, German chancellor Friedrich Merz, French president Emmanuel Macron and the UK's Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer. Stubb is known for his personal relationship with Trump, and is poised to be on-hand to quell any disputes between Trump and Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky, who will also be in attendance. Zelensky is reported to be wholly opposed to any demand to recognize Russian occupation of the Donbas as legitimate.
CNN
9 hours ago
- CNN
DC students head back to school amid Trump focus on cleaning up juvenile crime in the district
In southeast Washington, DC, children stood in line Friday to receive new backpacks filled with school supplies, while community organizers passed out free hot dogs and hamburgers to teenagers to celebrate the last few days of summer before. But just a few blocks away, the sight of National Guard trucks cut into the celebration — a reminder that the school year will begin under the shadow of federal troops. 'This is not going to go off well … most middle school kids walk to school by themselves. They're going to have to walk through soldiers and police,' Dara Baldwin, a DC-based activist on the Free DC advisory council, told CNN. 'They're going to be fearful for their lives. … They're either not going to want to go to school, or they're going to react to these people in their space.' President Donald Trump's deployment of federal law enforcement to the nation's capital to combat what he has described as 'roving mobs of wild youth' has ignited fear among parents, activists and youth advocates that Black and Latino teens will face heightened policing as they return to class next week. When Trump announced he was placing the District of Columbia's police department under federal control and deploying National Guard troops, he argued that youth crime in DC demanded urgent intervention. According to a report from the DC Policy Center, the juvenile arrest rate in DC is nearly double the national rate. Data from the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council, an independent DC agency that tracks public safety statistics, shows that total juvenile arrests during the first half of 2025 have largely remained consistent with the number in the first half of each year since 2023, when there was an increase after the Covid-19 pandemic. Looking specifically at juvenile arrests for violent offenses, which includes robberies, aggravated assaults and assaults with a deadly weapon, between 2019 and 2020, they dropped from 585 to 347, as did the overall number of arrests in DC during the beginning of the pandemic. That decline was short-lived: The numbers began climbing again in 2022, rising from 466 arrests for violent offenses to 641 in 2023 before dropping again in 2024 to 496, according to the data from the CJCC. Youth advocates cite the city's investment in more resources and programs targeting young people as part of the reason for the drop in arrests for violent offenses. In 2023, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser issued a declaration of a juvenile crime emergency which focused city resources on addressing the issue. This year the DC Council approved stricter juvenile curfews that also give the city's police chief the ability to double down with even stricter emergency short-term curfews. She used those curfews recently around Navy Yard, an area near the Washington Nationals ballpark and the waterfront. 'It's clear that the target is the inner-city youth,' Kelsye Adams, an activist for DC statehood and director of DC Vote, told CNN at a rally outside of the Metropolitan Police Department headquarters on Friday. 'And what I've seen on the news from where the police checkpoints and the neighborhoods that they're going in, they are directly attacking young, Black and brown kids.' The White House says the administrations policies are aimed at making DC safer. 'Washington DC leaders have failed the city's youth – juvenile crime has been a serious concern for residents and local leaders even before President Trump's intervention to Make DC Safe Again,' Abigail Jackson, a White House spokeswoman, told CNN in a statement. 'The status quo of ignoring kids committing violent crimes has not worked, it has only exasperated the situation – President Trump is making DC safe again for everyone.' The DC Metropolitan Police Department did not respond to CNN's request for comment. CNN has spoken to more than a dozen DC residents about Trump's crime crackdown and whether it will impact the children in their communities – and some parents say the extra presence could reduce violence. 'I got mixed reactions with that,' Kim Hall, 45, a longtime district resident who has three children in the DC public school system, told CNN at the backpack event in Anacostia. 'To me, it actually makes the street more safe, because a lot of the crime that goes on, especially over there in southwest and southeast, is happening while the kids are going to school or they're coming out of school.' 'If the police is around, there won't be so much of the gun violence,' she added. Anthony Motley, 76, a DC resident who has 10 grandchildren in the school system, told CNN that young people are 'the future, and we need to protect the future. So, whatever we need to do to protect our future, I'm for that.' Others CNN spoke with, including Sharelle Stagg, a DC resident and educator in the public school system, aren't convinced that increased patrols and law enforcement are going to help their children. 'I'm not certain this is the best strategy, especially when you think about just the way that it was rolled out and kind of presented to communities,' Stag said. Tahir Duckett, executive director of the Center for Innovations in Community Safety at Georgetown Law School, agrees that Trump deploying National Guard troops to DC could make violence worse, not better. 'When you have these major shows of force, and you have people who feel like the police aren't actually part of the community, but are more of an occupying force, then you tend to see people not want to cooperate with the police,' he said, which 'can lead to increased crime rates.' Youth advocates also told CNN they are young Black and Brown men will be the most impacted by the larger law enforcement presence. Black children make up more than half of DC's youth population, according to census data. 'I've been brought up into the community where we've seen this often. So it might look different to some other people, but not me, not the community that I come from, and our communities have been targeted for years,' Carlos Wilson, who works with Alliance of Concerned Men, a group that helps inner-city youth and hosted the back to school event in southeast DC, told CNN. He argued that Trump could use the funding for more resources to help young people in this city instead of on an increased law enforcement presence. 'That's what's gonna make it better, more programs, more opportunities for the younger folks. I think that's what's gonna make our community better. Not police presence. We need resources. We need help, not people coming in.'
